Winter Kisses
by Herutsu Oshii
Summary: One winter night, in the Forest of Dean, Hermione and Harry discover their feelings for eachother. Non DH compliant.


**A/N: This is in response to The First Kiss Challenge on HPFC. There were two ways to do it and I chose the hard way. I was assigned the pairing Harry/Hermione and had to write their first kiss. My prompts were snowflakes, muggle photographs, and stars.**

**I hope you like it!**

…**..**

**~~Winter Kisses~~**

"Hermione, it's my turn to keep watch," Harry said coming out of the tent. Hermione was seated on a blanket, wrapped in her coat and multiple sweaters looking at what seemed to be a book.

"It's okay Harry I honestly don't mind sitting out here. I love looking at the stars, although they are beginning to be covered with clouds," replied Hermione. She looked up and flashed him a smile. Harry sat down on the blanket next to her, "Then at least let me sit with you," he replied, "What are you looking at?"

"An old photo album from my childhood," Hermione answered, "I was so happy with my parents." She smiled as she thought back to the days of being a worry free child.

"Can I look?" Harry questioned. She nodded in response while Harry flipped back, closer to the beginning. He stopped when he saw a four year old Hermione dressed in a pumpkin costume holding what would have been a matching pumpkin if it weren't for the crooked grin. He pointed at it, "Looking good Hermione." Hermione smiled again and touched the photograph.

"It was Halloween," she began, "Every year we used to go to a farm outside of London and pick three pumpkins, one for each of us, a few days before Halloween. That year it was a warm fall day and the trees looked so pretty. When we got to the farm my parents told me that I could carve my own pumpkin that year. I was so excited that I made the smile crooked, but I loved it anyways."

Harry, who had never done anything like that as a child, smiled and said, "That sounds wonderful."

"We'll do it next year," she said, "If the war is…" She didn't have to finish as they both silently added, '_When the war is over_,' in their heads. Harry recovered quickly and flipped forward a few more pages to a picture of a slightly older, laughing Hermione twirling around in a field of flowers with her also laughing mother. Each outstretched hand was full of wildflowers.

'_Her dad must have taken that photo_,' he thought

"One day in the spring my dad came home early from work and told Mum and I that he had a surprise for us. We got into the car with a picnic and drove for what must have been an hour. I sat in the backseat looking at first the city, then the farms, and the forests. Finally we arrived at a place that had hills on either side of the road. Dad told us to get out of the car and he grabbed the picnic. He said we had to climb over the hill to get to where we were going. Mum took my hand and we all climbed the hill. When we got to the top I saw the surprise. It was a field of flowers that seemed to stretch on forever. I ran down the hill and started gathering flowers in my hands. Dad snapped this picture of Mum and I twirling and laughing in sheer delight," she finished.

'_Her parents must have loved her so much_,' Harry thought, slightly jealous of the fun childhood he had never gotten.

"You guys look really close," he responded.

"We were," she said softly, gazing at the picture, "They were my closest friends until Hogwarts started.

Harry flipped forward to another picture of Hermione at about age 7. This time Hermione laughed out loud. The picture showed a very grumpy looking Hermione at Christmastime (you could tell by the colors of her sweater) with ballet slippers on her lap.

"What happened here?" Harry questioned.

"Well it was Christmas day and that year I had asked for 10 books for Christmas. I was very excited to get them but when I opened my first present it was ballet slippers. My parents explained the Santa Claus and them had gotten together and decided I needed to try new things. They told me that Santa thought I should try ballet so he got me shoes and ballet lessons for Christmas instead of the books. I was so upset about not getting the books, but when I started ballet I ended up loving it."

"Hermione, I didn't know that you danced!" Harry exclaimed, "How come you never told us?"

"I guess it never came up," Hermione shrugged. Harry found himself thinking about how pretty Hermione must look while she danced as he turned to another picture. '_Whoa! Where did that thought come from?_' he wondered. He kept flipping until he was almost near the end of the album. He stopped at one of Hermione blowing out the candles on her birthday cake. It seemed that the only people at her party were her parents, he wondered why.

"Now this one is kind of sad," started Hermione, "It was my eleventh birthday. You should know that around the age of 10 and 11 girls start to act cliquier. When you aren't really pretty, a.k.a. have huge hair and buck teeth, when you are smarter than most people your age, when you don't really care for clothing, and you love reading, you aren't really accepted among girls and boys alike. Not to mention I had starting showing signs of magic and that made me even more different. My friends started ignoring me or teasing me all the time. I had no one. My birthday party was just my parents and I. When I blew out those candles on that cake I wished that I could go to a new place with people who liked me. A few weeks later there was a knock on the door. It was Dumbledore. He explained to my parents that I was a witch and that I was invited to go to Hogwarts the following year." She looked kind of sad when she finished so Harry wrapped his arms around her and gave her a hug.

'_I just want to kiss away all her sadness and loneliness,_' he thought, surprising himself.

'_Harry is looking particularly cute tonight,_' Hermione thought, leaning into Harry. She opened her eyes wide when she realized what she had just thought. It was then she felt an icy cold drop on her head. Then she felt another, and another. She looked up, "Harry it's snowing!" Harry looked up too and saw it was indeed snowing. It was a really beautiful sight. Harry looked back down at the album and saw there was one more photo taped to the back cover. It was the only magical photo in the album. In the photo there were three smiling first years in Hogwarts uniforms; Harry, Hermione, and Ron. The photo versions of themselves were waving up at them.

"You remember taking this one at the end of first year, don't you?" Hermione asked. Harry nodded. "That year was the first year I was truly happy since I was 9. It was the year I met my two best friends, you and Ron." They smiled and stared at the photo, remembering their eventful first year. After a while Harry's eye's strayed to Hermione's face as she looked at the photograph.

'_The snow makes her look even prettier than she normally is,_' he thought, kind of getting used to the thoughts about Hermione running through his head.

"Hermione can I ask you a slightly personal question?" he asked.

"Sure Harry, you're my best friend, you can ask me anything," replied Hermione.

"Well, I was wondering…It seemed like you and Ron were getting kind of close…And I was just wondering if in the future you and him were going to, you know, um, get together?"

Hermione laughed softly with a slightly disgusted look on her face, "Harry, I have no plans on getting together with Ronald and if anything, him just abandoning us solidified those plans even further. Why do you ask?"

"I was just wondering," he replied quickly.

"Oh," she said disappointed. They sat in thought, looking at the snowflakes fall to the ground for a few minutes. Then Hermione said, "I'm kind of tired, I think I'm gonna go to bed now…"

"Oh, okay," Harry started, Hermione began to get up, but before she could Harry pulled on her arm, "Wait, Hermione, before you go could I ask you one more question?"

"Uh, sure Harry," Hermione settled back on the blanket.

"Have you ever been kissed?" rushed out of his mouth.

"No, b– ," Hermione was cut off by Harry pressing his lips against hers. They didn't feel any electricity or anything cheesy like that, but their kiss felt extremely right to the both of them. When they broke apart they both had shy smiles on their faces.

"Goodnight Harry," Hermione said quietly, she gave him another quick kiss before getting up and ducking into the tent.

"Goodnight Hermione," he called back.

About twenty feet away Ron leaned back against the tree he was hiding behind and sighed. Although he couldn't see them he had heard their whole conversation. He apparated back to Shell Cottage for now, knowing that he wasn't going to be welcomed back just yet.

…**.**

**A/N: I hope you liked it! It was really tough for me to write because I don't like this pairing at all. I think the romantic stuff kind of came on quickly and was really cheesy because I don't really know how to write for this pairing. Anyways, please review!**

**-Herutsu**


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